A well (e.g., a vertical well, near-vertical well, deviated well, horizontal well, or multi-lateral well) can pass through various hydrocarbon bearing reservoirs or may extend through a single reservoir for a relatively long distance. A technique to increase the production of the well is to perforate the well in a number of different zones, either in the same hydrocarbon bearing reservoir or in different hydrocarbon bearing reservoirs.
An issue associated with producing from a well in multiple zones relates to the control of the flow of fluids into the well. In a well producing from a number of separate zones, in which one zone has a higher pressure than another zone, the higher pressure zone may produce into the lower pressure zone rather than to the surface. Similarly, in a horizontal well that extends through a single reservoir, zones near the “heel” of the well (the zones nearer the surface) may begin to produce unwanted water or gas (referred to as water or gas coning) before those zones near the “toe” of the well (the zones further away from the earth surface). Production of unwanted water or gas in any one of these zones may require special interventions to be performed to stop production of the unwanted water or gas.
In other scenarios, certain zones of the well may have excessive drawdown pressures, which can lead to early erosion of devices or other problems.
To address coning effects or other issues noted above, flow control devices are placed into the well. There are various different types of flow control devices that have conventionally been used to equalize flow rates (or drawdown pressures) in different zones of a well. Some conventional flow control devices employed tortuous paths to provide a flow restriction before fluid is allowed to enter a flow conduit from the surrounding reservoir(s). However, such flow control devices generally suffer from lack of flexibility and/or are relatively complex in design.